Alternatives to Sex

by Stephen McCauley

  An older couple gathered their belongings as the train approached Harvard Square. Charlotte and Sam very likely imagined they’d spend their evenings doing this sort of thing once they moved to town, attending lectures and concerts. Probably they would, too.

  I suddenly wished I were returning from a long concert or one of those intellectually challenging cultural events that are equivalent to reading Simone de Beauvoir. I indulged in a fantasy of going to Symphony Hall with Charlotte and Sam, all of us returning together on the subway, they making my evening a little less lonely, I making theirs more interesting, just because a third person (any third person) often does.

  I liked being caught up in Charlotte’s little plot against her husband. It showed how well she knew him, how much respect she had for him—no matter what Jack had said—and how much she trusted me. For a fleeting moment, thinking about the two of them, I felt myself flush with the warmth of infatuation I often experience for inappropriate people. The warmth made the world, even the subway car, brighter, more hopeful. No doubt Ron had felt this warmth last September when he met Marshall, and had thought it would last forever.

  Edward undoubtedly would find something dismissive to say about Sam and Charlotte, but he would like them, and I had a strong suspicion they would both be charmed by him. Once they moved to town, we could go out as a foursome. Edward had, in the past, made a number of suggestions that he and I go on vacation together, but the idea struck me as dangerously intimate, the two of us wandering around a hotel room draped in towels. With another couple along, it would be a more jovial group. Unless, of course, it turned out that they were fundamentalist Christians, or Sam was a closet case, or, as is so often true, both things.

  The fantasy dimmed when I got off at my stop, climbed the stairs to the balmy street, and started the long walk home through the crowded neighborhoods of Somerville. Halfway up the steep hill I live on, I saw the looming silhouette of my house. The lights were off on both floors, and if I hadn’t known the house was there, it might have looked like one of the only empty lots on the street.

  Exactly on Time

  Edward lived in a bright studio apartment on the fringes of the South End of Boston. With characteristic prescience, he’d bought his place at the last moment that one could get the legendary good deal, and since he’d owned it, its value had quadrupled. I sometimes brought Edward listings of apartment sales in his neighborhood and watched with pleasure as he studied the numbers with the excitement of a recovered drunk mixing a cocktail for someone else.

  I rang his buzzer, as arranged, at eight o’clock. He let me in with a look of irritation and immediately went into the bathroom and shut the door behind him. “You’re early,” he shouted.

  I dropped onto his sofa and picked up a magazine. “I’m exactly on time, young man.”

  “Same thing.”

  Through the door, I could hear the usual cacophony of aerosol cans and rushing water. I’d never once visited Edward when I wasn’t forced to wait while he went through an elaborate cleaning, shaving, and moisturizing ritual. In every other respect, Edward was compulsively prompt and precise about time, so I knew his behavior with regard to me was a deliberate ploy. It made me feel like a high school boy being forced to wait while his prom date put the final touches on her makeup. I liked complaining to Edward about this annoying ceremony, but I was flattered that he cared enough about what I thought of his appearance to bother.

  Although small, Edward’s apartment was furnished and outfitted in ingenious ways that gave the illusion of space. Edward had made all of the built-in shelves, bookcases, and cabinets himself, along with doing most of the electrical work and a good deal of the plumbing. His skill at complicated home repairs was only one of his surprising traits. He could also sew, play a tidy repertoire of sing-along standards on the piano, and—despite never having driven a car—accurately diagnose automotive problems and then go a long way toward fixing them. I’d always been amused and charmed by watching Edward, not the most stereotypically masculine man on the planet, installing dishwashers and confidently building closets. This tidal wave of eclectic abilities should have induced in me massive feelings of inadequacy, but it was impossible to begrudge him his accomplishments.

  He was a self-made Renaissance man who spent a lot of his downtime on airplanes studying history books, manuals of do-it-yourself home repair, magazines analyzing the performance of assorted mutual funds, and reading a number of Great Books, invariably identifying heavily with the oppressed and self-destructive heroines.

  Edward’s Story

  Edward had grown up in Cincinnati, the only child of a pair of religious fanatics (a phrase that was becoming, in the newly terrified and confused America, more and more of a redundancy) who belonged to a cult version of Christianity. If you could believe Edward—and most of the time, I did—his parents talked endlessly about their love of Jesus, as if they were close personal friends. (“As I was saying to Jesus this morning…” “Jesus has such a cute smile.”) And yet, their Jesus was also a petty, vengeful snoop with the worst traits of a nosy neighbor and a grotesquely malevolent baby-sitter, constantly wagging a finger of reproach, and whispering suggestions in your ear that you blow up a Planned Parenthood office.

  Listening to Edward talk about his upbringing made me feel lucky to have had parents who paid lip service to piety but drove my brother and me thirty miles each Sunday to a little Catholic chapel that specialized in fifteen-minute masses. I’m sure there’s a place for religious conviction, but on the whole, freedom of religion pales in importance next to freedom from it.

  Edward’s parents claimed to have known that their only child was gay from the moment of his birth, but upon being presented with the evidence when Edward was sixteen—in the form of an incident involving a basement recreation room and a cousin in the National Guard—they acted as if Edward had chosen his sexual preference as a way of getting them in trouble with their unforgiving, heavenly best friend. (“Jesus is going to think it’s our fault,” they’d reportedly said. “It’s not that we don’t love you, Edward, but we have to show Jesus we don’t approve.”)

  Becoming a flight attendant got him out of town and kept him on the move, the homosexual equivalent of joining the military. I couldn’t decide whether Edward’s choice of career was perfect or complete lunacy. He loved being at home, and was consumed by his many home improvement projects, and hated almost all forms of travel, from flying to taking the subway across town. But in other ways, it was a perfect job for him since it allowed him to indulge in his basic love of taking care of people without letting down the impervious stance that was the heart of his defense against the world.

  Contemptuous Compassion

  I checked my watch after a few more minutes of rushing water. “I hope you aren’t drawing a bath in there,” I said. “And what’s the big news you have for me? What stunning changes are you about to make?”

  “Relax. I’ll tell you in the restaurant. You’re not reading one of those shelter magazines, are you? There’s no point in that, William, since you couldn’t stand the dust involved in the home improvements you need.”

  Of course, he was right; I’d picked up a copy of Metropolitan Home and was deep into the story of the amazing things Harry and Charles, a jovial, meticulous pair, had done to their Detroit loft. I believed these shelter magazines with their blasé acceptance of the Harry-and-Charles partnership were among the most subversive publications in the country. Harry and Charles and countless others like them talked for pages about choosing wallpaper and fabrics and designing their bathroom, and then, in the most casual and unflustered way, the author would mention that “the couple likes to give impromptu dinners for their friends” or that “the pair shares their bedroom with their three-year-old golden retriever.” I approved of the politics of these articles, although the focus on partnered domesticity sometimes made me feel like half a person. It might be nice to see a story in which one of my lonely, aesthetically challenged
basement dwellers was profiled. Or maybe a story in which an obsessive-compulsive cleaner rambles on for pages about his new iron or his German vacuum cleaner. “What William Collins lacks in taste and anything resembling a domestic life,” the article might read, “he makes up for in cleanliness.”

  I threw the magazine down so Edward wouldn’t be so eerily right about what I was reading. “I’m not reading anything,” I said. “And please hurry, I’m starving.”

  “I wish I’d known,” he said. “I’d have made reservations at one of those big restaurants where they expect you to eat.”

  He emerged from the bathroom looking slightly damp and shiny. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “Nothing’s wrong. Why do you ask?”

  “You’re making one of those faces. As if I look weird, but you’re not going to tell me why or how.”

  “You’re imagining things.”

  Edward almost always looked tidy and nicely arranged, even when he was in the middle of a messy plastering or painting job. He had a narrow, lean body that seemed to shrug off fat and all attempts to develop musculature. Despite the time he spent with his assorted personal trainers, his slight body remained stubbornly true to itself. On the whole, I’m a little troubled by bodies that clearly have been tortured into nonindigenous shapes, even beautiful ones. It’s like looking at someone wearing clothes that don’t fit or an expensive hairpiece improperly attached.

  But maybe that’s my rationalization for never using a rowing machine I’d bought ten years earlier.

  Edward’s minimal height, sandy hair, and large, puppy-dog forehead made him look deceptively boyish, as if he hadn’t quite grown into his final form. Boyish looks are a great advantage when you’re in your twenties, but as Edward edged past his middle thirties, they were becoming a little less marketable. “Like trying to sell a thirty-seven-year-old bottle of Beaujolais nouveau,” he’d once told me.

  The top of his blond head came up to my shoulder.

  At work, Edward had developed an interpersonal style I thought of as contemptuous compassion. His facial expressions and body language always seemed to be saying, May I help you? and, Don’t invade my space! at the same time. It served him well in the cramped aisles of a jetliner; in the real world, it made him seem aloof and unapproachable. Edward was chagrined and proud of the fact that he intimidated people, as if it were a curse he’d worked hard to acquire.

  “You think this shirt is ridiculous,” he croaked in his ruined voice. “You think it’s out of season, and I’m too scrawny, and the color is all wrong for my pallor.”

  He was wearing a jersey, a red cotton thing with white stripes, a polo costume filtered through a designer he probably couldn’t afford. Edward had pale blue eyes and uneven ears that were far too big for his head, and the shirt accentuated a slight Howdy Doody aspect of his I found completely lovable. “I didn’t say anything,” I reminded him.

  “You didn’t have to. It was all in your mute horror.”

  “You look adorable.”

  “Adorable? In other words, it’s too young for me.”

  “You look perfect.”

  He shook his head in disgust. “I count on you to lie to me, but what’s the point if you don’t do it convincingly?”

  “Well, what’s the point at all if you know I’m lying?”

  He slid open a drawer on one of his built-in cabinets and pulled on a dark, shapeless sweater that covered all of the jersey and half of his gray pants.

  “What’s the point in God or Mozart or a seat cushion that doubles as a flotation device?”

  “I give up.”

  “They give you a little lift, the passing illusion the universe isn’t completely chaotic and that you just might be able to swim to shore. That’s all I’m asking from you, a little uplifting dishonesty.”

  The rant was so clearly motivated by circumstances beyond my control, I figured it was best to change the subject. “You’ve made some improvements since I was last here.”

  “When was that?”

  “I’m not sure. A month ago, maybe?”

  “You haven’t been here since May. You insist we meet at movie theaters and restaurants, someplace you can escape from easily, to go do whatever you do.”

  “Parking is difficult,” I said.

  Edward straightened out my necktie and then, dissatisfied with the results, made a tighter knot. The products he’d been using in the bathroom gave off a woody scent, combined with the faint smell of the sweat he’d worked up applying all of them. I drank in his clean scent while he took care of my tie. “Parking,” he scoffed. “I almost wish I had a license so I could haul out the parking problem every time I’m late.”

  “You’re rarely late,” I pointed out.

  “Thank you for noticing.”

  I wasn’t sure why Edward had never had a driver’s license, but I assumed it must have had to do with an early childhood trauma involving his father, the all-purpose tyrant. He certainly had no fears of being driven around by other people, and I genuinely liked to drive him places, since it gave me immediate control over him.

  He patted the tie back into place against my stomach. “You’re too skinny,” he said. “Twenty-year-olds interested in men your age expect beer bellies. It’s part of the appeal.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “Well, now that you’re in my apartment for the first time in months, let’s leave.”

  Dave?

  Edward’s street was a quiet refuge from the bustle of the city—dotted with low, meticulously renovated brownstones and recently planted trees that were still in full leaf that September night, with only the faint suggestion of autumn color. The rain of the preceding days had washed the streets and sidewalks, and the air smelled clean and sweet.

  What I liked best about Edward’s neighborhood was the way new forty-story hotels and commercial buildings had been built up to the edge of the brownstones. That wall of steel and glass should have dwarfed and overwhelmed the brick houses like Edward’s, but instead, they created deep, cool shadows during the heat of the day and offered glittering light shows in the evening. Edward’s little apartment, I liked to imagine, was protected by this fortress of new construction.

  “I do buy some age-appropriate clothes,” Edward said as we crossed through a garden with a sputtering fountain. His neighborhood was lousy with sputtering fountains. “I just haven’t started wearing them yet.”

  “Take your time,” I told him and put my arm around his shoulder. “Once you start wearing age-appropriate clothes, there’s no turning back. Enjoy your folly while you can.”

  Since last September, every middle-aged person I knew had decided to work on aging with grace and dignity. In light of what had happened, who would be shallow enough to even consider facial surgery or cosmetic injections? But thus far, none of my friends had perfected the plans for dignity. Edward was buying but not wearing age-appropriate clothes. My friend Miranda had stopped going out to nightclubs and was, instead, drinking at home alone. Tom had sworn off trying to pick up men half his age and had started paying for them instead. Laura had given up blaming her mother for all her problems and had started blaming her children. And so on.

  Prompted by the resolutions of my friends, I had decided that continuing to see Didier, my Belgian sexual obsession of two or more years, was unbecoming for a man of my age. Undignified. He was a compulsive liar, a scrawny weasel, had the worst smoker’s cough I had ever heard, and for reasons that baffled me, I couldn’t get enough of him. I literally couldn’t get much of him since he was so spectacularly evasive, a key element of his appeal. In a fit of trumped up, posttraumatic, get-a-grip dignity, I told him I didn’t want to see him anymore and forbade him to call me. “I’m ready for something a little more real,” I’d told him. To distract myself, I’d lurched into the world of semianonymous computer hookups, behavior that hadn’t proved any more age-appropriate, although considering what my online age was, it didn’t, initially, look quite as
bad.

  I was finding my middle years tough. Optimistic youth is spent talking yourself into believing that at any moment you’ll do something bold, brave, and significant, while the calm post-sixty years are spent talking yourself into believing that you might have done something bold, brave, and significant but for bold, brave, significant, and unspecified reasons, you chose not to. At my age, I was living in the cold waters of semireality, trying to swim from one set of delusions to the temporary safe harbor of the next.

  What did I want? I wondered as we crossed Tremont Street, my arm still on Edward’s shoulder. Edward was describing the antics of an obstreperous passenger on a flight from Dallas, a tale I was only half listening to. Why had I thought first of calling him when I decided to attempt making some changes in my own life?

  A car ran a red light, and I grabbed Edward and reeled him in. He looked up at me, stopping his story midsentence, and I felt my cell phone vibrate in my pocket. “Go ahead and answer,” he said.

  “You couldn’t have heard that,” I said, taking out the phone.

  “You don’t think I felt it, do you?”

  The number displayed on the screen was unknown to me, a warning sign I ignored. A muffled voice said, “Is this Everett?”

  The most prudent thing to do would have been to hang up, but because I’m basically an honest person, I said, “Yes, it is.”

  “Hey, Everett, this is Dave.”

  Dave—who knows why?—is another wildly popular fake name. This guy even pronounced it as if there were quote marks around it.

  “Dave. Right.”